Why is chocolate expensive?
If you count the changing seasons by the stock of holiday chocolates in your grocery store's seasonal aisle, you might be surprised by another significant change that comes along with the colorful packaging. Chocolate, like many other foods, is about to become more expensive. While inflation and ongoing supply chain issues have caused wholesale chocolate & retail prices to rise in 2022, the reason for this increase is much larger and may be long-term. Chocolate companies have faced numerous challenges in recent years. According to the Wall Street Journal, the price of cocoa beans fell in 2021, which was good for candy makers. However, these companies have recently had difficulty sourcing some of the raw ingredients required to make chocolate at the price consumers have grown accustomed to. Chocolate is typically made of cocoa beans, cocoa butter, milk, and sugar (plus an emulsifier like soy lecithin), according to Read Cacao, but half of those ingredients are cur...